The United States Constitution prohibits the federal government as well as state governments from depriving individuals of specifically protected liberty rights. There are exceptions. In Pennsylvania the health and well-being of the community at large may supersede individual rights of freedom and liberty.

Although matters relating to public health have been left largely to individual states to manage, the federal government does have jurisdiction over cases where communicable disease is introduced into this country from a foreign source or to prevent or curtail the interstate movement of communicable disease.

The DPCL defines quarantine as the “limitation of freedom of movement of persons . . . who have been exposed to a communicable disease.” The limitations may continue for a period of time equal to the incubation period of the disease. Isolation is the separation of persons already infected, from other people to prevent direct transmission of disease.

In the months following the September 11th attack, the Pennsylvania legislature went even further by enacting the Counterterrorism Planning, Preparedness and Response Act (Act). The Act provides the governor with authority to order the temporary isolation or quarantine of individuals or groups. The Act, although not clear, was intended for use following a suspected act of bioterrorism. The statute does not specifically preclude the Act from being utilized during a pandemic.

The governor has also been empowered to order a “cordon sanitaire” which is the quarantining of an entire town or city. Such an order from the governor is subject to judicial review.

(Image: U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officials have a conference call on Ebola earlier this week with CDC team members deployed in West Africa from the agency's Emergency Operations Center in Atlanta. David Goldman/Associated Press)

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